Rima’s Story: In Her Writing

We recently posted a snippet of Rima’s letter, written in her words in French. Through the kind help of John, we were able to get the original letter translated into Arabic and English. Thank you!

Sometimes the best therapy is writing. It helps us make sense of what we’ve gone through in an open, honest manner. And no doubt this was a hard thing to do – and even harder, to share with others. We hope this helps other women going through the same thing by providing some insight, inspiration and strength.

Below are the first few words describing Rima’s journey to recovery:

My story with cancer started on the 6th of December 2008, at the age of 44.

I discovered it one evening in bed, while palpating my right breast by chance, where I discovered a nodule. It was not soft; but on the contrary, it was hard enough and it was clinging to my breast on its external side just like a limpet.

The first thing I did was jumping out of my bed, terrified, to show it to my husband who was watching television. I was convinced that it was cancer, not a cyst nor a benign thing.

Why I was so sure about it? I don’t know. It was just a feeling that was confirmed later. I was very scared. I had an awful night. All kinds of thoughts and scenarios were crossing my mind especially that my cousin was affected by breast cancer at the age of 44, and I saw her suffering when she visited me in Paris in order to follow her treatment.

At the beginning, I did not know that there could be several degrees and several types in the disease. All I had in my mind was that I was going to pass through the same things that my cousin suffered from; I mean chemotherapy, radiotherapy, total ablation of the breast, etc. I was scared of metastasis… scared of being unable to see my children growing up, scared of dying young.

I still wanted to enjoy life.

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Page 1 of 3. Want to read the rest?

* Contact us at onewigstand@gmail.com to receive a free PDF copy of Rima’s letter. Available in English, French and Arabic (all translations by Samar Hajj Ali) *